The Erotic Literary Salon will be held Tuesday, February 21. The evening will start with the Adult Sex-Ed Salon a one-hour program devoted to sex and sexuality. The audience will create this month’s theme. They will have the opportunity to pose any questions regarding sex and sexuality anonymously. Sexologist Susana Mayer, PhD, along with co-host Walter will facilitate the Adult Sex-Ed Salon and attendees interested in sharing their knowledge and experiences will join in the discussion.

Underneath the shallow trinkets of love — flowers, candy and dinner — lies a deep longing inside of us all to feel connected, to belong, to rest inside of one another. This longing plays out in how we sex, how we fight, how we navigate the tricky terrain of our relationships. In her annual Valentine’s performance, poet and storyteller Monica Day will explore how our deepest desire to be loved collides with our unspoken fear: what if we are unlovable? An exploration filled with tenderness, vulnerability — and her signature erotic overtones — this performance will infuse the Valentine’s month with depth and realness. Please join us.

PHILADELPHIA: The Erotic Literary Salon, unique in the English-speaking world has launched a growing movement mainstreaming erotica. Salons attract a supportive audience of 65 or more individuals. Approximately 15 attendees participate as writers, readers, storytellers, spoken word performers of original works/words of others, the rest just come to listen, enjoy and applaud.

Salons gather the 3rd Tuesday of every month at TIME (The Bohemian Absinthe Lounge), 1315 Sansom Street, Center City, Philadelphia. Doors open at 6:30 p.m., for cocktails, food and conversation. Adult Sex-Ed between 7:00-8:00, readings begin at 8:30. Admission is $12, discounted for students and seniors to $10. Salon attendees must be 21.

Creator of this event, Dr. Susana, is Philadelphia’s best-known sexologist. She lends her voice to the Salon by offering relevant information to support the discussions that arise in the Salon and blog.

“…surprisingly comfortable….Salon devotees praise her for the space she has created….”

“I think Susana is doing a very brave thing.”

Philadelphia Inquirer, February 10, 2010

“There are laughter and tears along with the hot rush of blood – to the face.

Daily News, March 15, 2010

“I never knew such a life of honesty could exist. I finally found a home I can be comfortable in…this event changed my life.

Tonight join a full house of Salon attendees as we enjoy romance from a male’s perspective.

“We are born to love,” writes anthropologist Helen Fisher. She claims, “That feeling of elation that we call romantic love is deeply embedded in our brains. But can it last?” The article below offers conclusions based on several studies.

The Psychology Of Loves That Last A Lifetime

The trifecta of a romantic relationship — intense love, sexual desire and long-term attachment — can seem elusive, but it may not be as uncommon or unattainable in marriages as we’ve been conditioned to think.

The science tells us that romantic love can last — and more than we often give it credit for. As a culture, we tend to be pretty cynical about the prospect of romantic love (as opposed to the ‘other’ loves — lust and long-term attachment) enduring over time and through obstacles, and for good reason. Roughly 50 percent of marriages end in divorce, with 2.4 million U.S. couples splitting in 2012. And among those that stay together, marital dissatisfaction is common.

In long-term partnerships that do succeed, romantic love tends to fade into companionship and a love more akin to friendship than to that of a couple in love.

But no matter how cynical we are about the prospect of life-long love, it still seems to be what most Americans are after. Romantic love is increasingly viewed as an essential component of a marriage, with 91 percent of women and 86 percent of American men reporting that they would not marry someone who had every quality they wanted in a partner but with whom they were not in love.

This type of love is good for both our marriages and our health. Romantic love — free from the craving and obsession of the early stages of falling in love —can and does frequently exist in long-term marriages, research has found, and it’s correlated with marital satisfaction, and individual well-being and self-esteem.

Although science has given us some insight on the nature of love and romantic relationships, this fundamental domain of human existence remains something of a mystery. Love, particularly the long-lasting kind, has been called one of the “most studied and least understood areas in psychology.”

There may be more questions than answers at this point, but we do know that both being in love and being married are good for your physical and mental health. And psychologists who study love, marriage and relationships have pinpointed a number of factors that contribute to long-lasting romantic love.

Here are six science-backed secrets of couples that keep intense romantic love alive for decades and entire lifetimes.

Life-long romance IS possible.

Despite high rates of divorce, infidelity and marital dissatisfaction, it’s not all hopeless — far from it, in fact. A 2012 study of couples who had been married for a decade, published in the journal Social Psychological and Personality Science, found that 40 percent of them said they were “very intensely in love.” The same study found that among couples who were married 30 years or more, 40 percent of women and 35 percent of men said they were very intensely in love.

But don’t be convinced solely by what these couples reported — research in neuroscience has also proven that intense romantic love can last a lifetime.

A 2011 study published in the journal Social Cognitive and Affective Neurosciencelooked the brain regions activated in individuals in long-term romantic partnerships (who had been married an average of 21 years), and compared them with individuals who had recently fallen in love. The results revealed similar brain activity in both groups, with high activity in the reward and motivation centers of the brain, predominantly in the high-dopamine ventral tegmental area (VTA). The findings suggest that couples can not only love each for long periods of time — they can stay in love with each other.

Sustaining romantic love over the course of many years, then, has a positive function in the brain, which understands and continues to pursue romantic love as a behavior that reaps cognitive rewards, according to positive psychology researcher Adoree Durayappah.

“The key to understanding how to sustain long-term romantic love is to understand it a bit scientifically,” Durayappah wrote in Psychology Today. “Our brains view long-term passionate love as a goal-directed behavior to attain rewards. Rewards can include the reduction of anxiety and stress, feelings of security, a state of calmness, and a union with another.”

They maintain a sense of “love blindness.”

When we first fall in love with someone, we tend to worship the ground they walk on and see them as the most attractive, smartest and accomplished person in the room. And while we might eventually take our partner off of this pedestal after months and years of being together, maintaining a sense of “love blindness” is actually critical to long-lasting passionate love.

A University of Geneva review of nearly 500 studies on compatibility couldn’t pinpoint any combination of two personality traits in a relationship that predicted long-term romantic love — except for one. One’s ability to idealize and maintain positive illusions about their partner — seeing them as good-looking, intelligent, funny and caring, or generally as a “catch” — remained happy with each other on nearly all measures over time.

They’re always trying new things together.

Boredom can be a major obstacle to lasting romantic or companionate love, and successful couples find ways to keep things interesting.

Psychological research has suggested that couples who experience the most intense love are the ones who not only experience a strong physical and emotional attraction to one another, but also who enjoy participating in new or challenging “self-expanding” activities together, Psychology Today reported.

Neediness is the enemy of long-lasting desire (an important component of romantic love), according to psychologist and Mating in Captivity author Esther Perel. In a popular TED Talk, Perel asks, “Why does sexual desire tend to fade over time, even in loving relationships?”

Neediness and caretaking in long-term partnerships — which can easily result from looking to the partnership for safety, security and stability — damper the erotic spark, Perel explains. But if couples can maintain independence and witness each other participating in individual activities at which they’re skilled, they can continue to see their partner in an ever-new light.

“When I see my partner on their own doing thing in which they are enveloped, I look at this person and I momentarily get a shift of perception,” Perel says. “[We] stay open to the mysteries that are standing right next to each other… What is most interesting is that there is no neediness in desire. There is no caretaking in desire.”

So if you’re looking to keep that spark going, give your partner the space to do what they’re good at — and make sure to take the opportunity to observe them in their element, when they are “radiant and confident,” says Perel.

Their passion for life carries over into their relationship.

Psychologists have found that a strong passion for life can help to sustain passion in a life-long romantic relationship. The 2012 Stony Brook University studyexamining personality qualities that predicted long-term passionate love found that individuals who exhibit excitement for all that life has to offer are more likely to find success in their romantic partnerships.

“People who approach their daily lives with zest and strong emotion seem to carry these intense feelings over to their love life as well,” Susan Krauss Whitbourne, Ph.D., wrote in Psychology Today. “If you want your relationship to have passion, put that emotional energy to work in your hobbies, interests, and even your political activities.”

They see their relationship as a journey together towards self-fulfillment.

Whereas individuals used to be more likely to look to marriage for safety and security, the societal standard has shifted such that more men and women enter into marriage looking for self-actualization and personal fulfillment. Such a marriage can be more satisfying for both partners, but requires each partner to invest more time and energy into the partnership for it to be successful.

Rather than looking to marriage to serve our basic needs for survival and companionship, we’re now seeing marriage as a vehicle for self-fulfillment. This new directive can help to facilitate long-term romantic love, so long as each partner is willing and able to put more of their resources into the relationship.

“As the expectations of marriage have ascended Maslow’s hierarchy, the potential psychological payoffs have increased,” Finkel noted, “but achieving those results has become more demanding.”

Found this lovely excerpt from a love poem waiting in my in-box. Taken from, “The Sea In You: Twenty poems of requited and unrequited love,” by David Whyte.

ALMOST SILENT (excerpt)

The almost silent rain

will heal me as it falls,

as if the sound itself

were a bed where I could lay

in your arms

letting the stream

of life

go by

unhurried

and easy

as I was with you

when

I wanted the hours

to linger on

and heaven to fall

and all the waters

of this mighty

world

run through me as

my memory of you

runs on

through my

waking body

…

Requited or unrequited, to love is to move between homecoming and exile, between the presence and absence of our beloved as well as ourselves. In this collection, human desire pulls with the force and rhythm of a sea tide, emerging from and receding into mysteries larger than any individual life. The book begins with the reverential title poem and concludes with four works that reflect the power of place to shape revelation; the way stone and sky and birdsong can point the way home. Whether tracing the sensual devotion of bodily presence or the painful heartbreak of impermanence, the poems keep faith with love’s appearances and disappearances, and the promises we make and break on its behalf.

You can listen to my interview along with others on the PULSE radio show on Love and Lust. It can be heard again, tomorrow, Sunday June 14th at 10AM on 90.9FM or via the link below. My segment is the last 10 minutes.

EBOOK – “SenSexual: A Unique Anthology 2013”

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4 Videos Below-Readings are only recorded at the request of the presenter.

Monica Day performance/reading two poems: The Fifth Year and This is My Body for January 2013 Erotic Literary Salon
M. Dante reading SKIN dedicated to the art and inspiration of Heide Hatry for December 2013 Erotic Literary Salon
Frances' reading,“Go the Fok to Sleep”
Dr. Susana Mayer’s NBC10 interview of “50 Shades of Grey”